What if food wasn’t a spectacle, but a sanctuary?

What if restaurants weren’t built for performance?
What if they weren’t chasing virality or designed to fit neatly into squares on a screen?

As a chef, I often find myself sitting with these questions — especially on those quiet drives home after a long dinner service, when the adrenaline fades and the existential weight sets in. What am I really doing this for?

What if food wasn’t a spectacle, but a sanctuary? What if a restaurant’s purpose wasn’t to impress, but to hold space — for memory, for meaning, for something real?

There’s a strange noise in the culinary world today.
Plates dressed for the camera. Gimmicks dressed as innovation. A race to be seen — faster, flashier, louder. And somewhere in that noise, something ancient, something soulful, is being forgotten.

Restaurants used to be places where time slowed down. Where stories were shared over steam rising from plates and bowls. Where the hands that cooked your meal were guided by instinct, not a branding deck. They weren’t designed to impress your followers. They were designed to feed your soul.

A good restaurant should not just be an escape from hunger, but an escape from the chaos. A place to feel, not just consume. To remember who you are, or maybe who you used to be — before the world told you to be efficient, aesthetic, optimized.

Food, at its best, is memory. It’s the whisper of your dadi’s hands preparing her evening tadka. It’s the warmth of something cooked slow, without shortcuts. It’s the pause you didn’t know you needed.

We don’t need more restaurants chasing applause.
We need more that stand quietly, firmly, in their truth.
That don’t bend tradition for a trend. That don’t sacrifice depth for dazzle. That don’t forget that food, at its core, is a language of love. At Darbar, this is the truth we return to, each and every day.

This is our quiet rebellion.

We’re not here to reinvent the tikka masala or the saag paneer — we’re here to respect it. Our sabjis are shaped by decades, by lineage, by a father’s legacy we’re still trying to honour. We cook like someone is coming home. Because often times, they are.

Every dish we serve is a reflection of those before us who cooked with love, with depth, and with purpose — not for applause, but for nourishment. For connection. For joy. For survival.

You won’t find edible foam or theatrics on our plates.
You’ll find depth. You’ll find balance. You’ll find soul.
And if you’re lucky, maybe even a little bit of yourself again.

And every night, it whispers to me on my drive home: What am I really doing this for?

For every guest that walks through our doors, Darbar should feel like comfort, like presence, like coming back to something real in a world that often feels like it's lost the plot.

In the end, a good restaurant isn’t about what’s on the plate. It’s about what it leaves behind. And that’s the legacy we’re building — one quiet, unapologetic dish at a time.

Like most chefs, I’ve learned — often the hard way — that reading reviews can take a toll on your mental health. You try to stay detached, to not let praise inflate you or criticism unravel you. But every now and then, a comment cuts through the noise. One, the other day, stopped me in my tracks:

“It feels like they cooked this just for me.”

The restaurants of tomorrow — the ones that will truly endure — must reclaim the soul of dining. They must prioritize taste over theatrics, story over spectacle, connection over clout. They must remember that the greatest compliments a guest can give aren’t about how their dish looked, but about how it made them feel. Seen. Heard. Full. Grounded. At peace.